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Maintenance
Most of the systems in an Earthship are designed to require minimal maintenance. Frist to look out is the front of the house. Need to understand the layout of the house. General maintenance Some things need to be maintained regularly in a house, e.g. monthly or weekly. A lot of this maintenance is preventative maintenance- making sure systems don't fall over in the future. Windows Only clean in one direction, or else can easily scratch. They do need to be clean, or else the performance is affected. If a window is fogging up, it may be an indicator that the seal between the glazing has been compromised. To fix it, will need to take the window out. Need to lay out the window, and cut out the glue holding the glass pieces together. Be careful when cutting off the glue/silicon, as want to use a speicial knife for the job. Once glass pieces separated, need to clean out the compromised material, reapply a new layer of separator, replace frame and put back. Wood Wood needs more maintenance in extreme climates. Solar panels Need to keep clean to keep efficiency up. Additionally, need to make sure back side of solar panel is not damaged or on the sides where the brackets are, when installing/maintaining. Leech field For leech field, need to make sure plants don't reach down far enough to the pipe. Retaining wall Usually nothing to do, but sometimes cracks will appear and thus need to be smoothed over. Suggest let tire walls sit for a month (if possible) so wall won't move later on. Glycol Typically a contained system, so not much to do. That said, the PSI may need to be checked. Seals/barriers Check if any gaps between doors/walls, etc. Grey water/black water pumps If problem with grey water pumps, e.g. the toilet is not flushing properly, check filters first. Then check the pumps. Might be some sediment stuck inside the pump housing (which can normally be pulled off). Next, if the plants are wiltering in some places (yellow, black), may indicate a problem with the water. Simple thing to try is flushing out the planter with clean water. This can help flush out containminents like highly toxic chemicals used e.g. in washing. Adobe walls If the wall is damaged e.g. punctured, written on, can usually easily fix by making wet and spreading out. Floors Concrete walls need no maintenance, but tire walls need more work. Refridgerator Need to check the gasket. Also, important to make sure a DC fridge has some "room to breath" or else the fridge will struggle to perform and hence use more power to function. Stoves LPG burns very hot, so thermal couplers will fail. Just needs a couple of taps to make it work a little longer (?). On-demand gas water heater Pilot light can often blow out. Also, the copper can often blow out in little spots, letting the water spill out. To fix this problem, can take the heater off the wall, open up, and use a special putty to repair the holes. Drinking spigot Don't want to drip (which is true for all faucets). Grease and particle collector Number 1 item of maintenance. Can send kitchen water to septic if just washing, but otherwise need to clean. If using panyhose system thingy, need to change when full and stinky. WOM Pour a bucket of water first. Isolate the WOM. Then pull the filters out and soak in very dilluted bleached water to kill any bacteria. Lubricate the O rings (vasiline or petrol gel). POM Some systems the DC is not protected from over draining the batteries, so need to be careful of that. Charge controllers can freak out when too much sun. Good idea to inspect if the charge controller is properly shutting off power to the batteries when they are full but there is lots of electricity being generated. Propane tank Do not paint, as the white enamel they typically have is to keep them cool (which is important). Cisterns Need to get in and clean occasionally. Recommend every 1.5 years. Battery box Often corrision builds up on the battery connections. Good idea to coat the exposed connections with anti-corrisive sap. May need to replace the distilled water in the battery. Make sure not to overfill. Usually fill to 1" above the plates. Tips Good idea to type up and print off + laminate instructions for each system that requires maintence. E.g. how to replace the water filters/what the PSI should be system X/etc.